


A much better festival

by stuff_and_nonsense



Category: The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-21
Updated: 2018-11-21
Packaged: 2019-08-27 06:24:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,359
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16697134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stuff_and_nonsense/pseuds/stuff_and_nonsense
Summary: A year after the events of the movie, Quasimodo enjoys the Feast of Fools with his friends.





	A much better festival

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Tam_Cranver](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tam_Cranver/gifts).



> Thank you to [htbthomas](/users/htbthomas/pseuds/htbthomas) for beta-ing!

“And now, to crown the King of Fools: last year’s champion, the city’s hero – Quasimodo!” Quasi burst onto the stage, through the trapdoor he’d been waiting below. He knew what to expect, but the size of the crowd still threw him, hundreds of people surrounding him on all sides. But they burst into cheers when he arrived, and the sound still thrilled him, filled his heart as much as it had his first ill-fated time here. He looked around: the smiles were genuine, fond, coming from people he’d greeted daily on the street over the past year.

Clopin held the crown, as floppy and garish as last year’s. He bowed almost horizontal as he presented it to Quasi with a flourish. The soon-to-be-king stood across the stage, waving woozily at the crowd. Quasi recognized him: Émile the fishmonger, drunk off his skull and painted with demonic makeup. The frightening effect was offset by a big dopey grin. “Very fearsome,” Quasi whispered to him anyway as he placed the crown on his head. Confetti and flower petals burst off the stage over the crowd below as they cheered again, the noise reverberating through the square.

Quasi took a bow and climbed back down through the trapdoor as the king was carried off the stage. He slipped out through the door in the side of the platform, and made his way to the spot where he’d agreed to meet Esmeralda. She hadn’t danced for the crowd this year. “I’m taking a break this year,” she’d told him. “I wanted to see what the festival’s like off-stage now that I’m more welcome here.”

He found her on the edge of the square, leaning against the wall of the cobbler shop. She was with a pair of other brightly-dressed women, laughing and joking, but she broke off when she saw him and leaned forward for a hug.

“Quasi!” she said. “I saw you up there – you did great!”

He blushed a little, despite himself. All he’d done really was stand there and pass the crown over, but the compliment was still nice. “Thank you,” he said. “Are you enjoying the festival?”

“Yes, it’s wonderful!” she said. “It’s much nicer this year without the guards hassling me. I’ve just been enjoying the crowd. Have you met Maria and Selene?” She gestured at the two women next to her. “They took over for me with the dance this year.”

“It’s a pleasure,” said Quasi, bobbing his head a little. “I’m sorry I didn’t get to see it – I was waiting under the stage.” 

“Nice to meet you too,” said one of them – Maria. “Esmeralda’s told us a lot about you. And don’t worry about it. I’m sure it was a mess compared to what we’re following up on.”

“Don’t be silly,” said Esmeralda, “you were fantastic. But I’ll catch up with you later, ok? Quasi and I have some things to pick up.”

They waved goodbye, and Quasi and Esmeralda set off, squeezing their way out of the main square. They had plans to meet up with Phoebus tonight after he got off shift, and they still had some preparations to make. The King of Fools was still being passed around above the crowd, and they fought to get out of the way before they were caught up in the revelers following him. Quasi was grateful for his thick body for once – it let him force a way through, and make a path for Esmeralda to follow. 

“This is almost making me miss the stage,” Esmeralda said as they made it out onto a side street. “It was much easier to get around jumping over everyone’s heads last year. But I guess I’m glad the guards aren’t chasing me this time.”

“Please try and keep it that way,” Quasi said. “You’ll scare me to death if I have to watch that happen again.”

“You have to admit it was pretty cool though, right?” said Esmeralda. “I’d skip the parts that came after, but that was a fun chase. I like this too though. I’m glad I know more people here now. It’s nice to be able to walk around without everyone squinting at me like I’m going to pick their pockets or steal their children.”

Quasi could certainly sympathize with that. “It’s been safer then?” he asked. “For you and your people?”

Esmeralda’s face twisted up a bit. “Well, it’s been better. At least for me, since Phoebus’s guards know me. But one change like that isn’t going to fix everything. Festival days are the best it gets for us though, so I can relax a little right now. We’ll see how fair the justice is tomorrow, when people start complaining again.”

He reached back and squeezed her hand, as gently as he possibly could. She squeezed it back, and smiled at him. “But for now I just want to get the food for tonight.” 

They made their way through the shops, gathering a small feast – sausages, roasted potatoes, cheese, little cakes. They’d carry it up to his tower, and watch the festival from above as they ate. A faint pang of guilt hit him at bringing luxuries like this into the cathedral. But that wasn’t how it worked, he reminded himself. God wouldn’t begrudge him a small pleasure with his friends, and no one else would be there to scold him for it. He picked up a few extra cakes to give to the kitchen boys at the cathedral though. Maybe that would balance the scales a little.

He hoped they were getting a chance to see some of the festival too. They were good kids, and he was lucky he’d gotten to know them. He’d stayed on at the cathedral after the events of the last year. It had made sense – someone still had to ring the bells, and he’d still need food and work and housing – so he was grateful the archdeacon had asked him. There had been an awkward transition period though. He still slept in his tower, but with no Frollo to bring him his meals there, he’d had to join the rest of the cathedral’s servants to eat. The monks and church officials took their meals separately, but there was a whole host of other people who cooked those meals, laundered the clothing, cleaned the cathedral. 

The first time he’d joined them for a meal, he’d nearly run off again. He’d walked from the cathedral to the living area nearby, to the room where the others who got their food and lodging from the church gathered for meals. He found it crowded with strangers, people of all ages chatting with each other as they ate. He recognized some of their faces, but had spoken to none, though he’d lived above them all his life.

They were all looking at him. He froze, nervous and uncertain as the talking died down. Then someone stepped forward to give him his meal, with a “well done the other day,” accompanying it. That broke the spell, and the conversations resumed, but Quasi spent the meal tongue-tied, unsure what to say to the people around him.

He’d gone to Esmeralda for advice. She was always so sure of herself, and so good with people. She’d know what to do. 

She thought about it for a moment. “When I met you, it was seeing your carvings that first made me realize there was more to you than I’d assumed. You could invite them up to the bell tower, show them what I saw.”

It wasn’t a bad idea. He’d overheard enough conversations to know not to open cold with that, but it was easy enough to map out a few lines of small-talk to lead into it – what’s your name, what work do you do? Practice would be harder than theory though. 

Still, he’d gone for it, starting easier with the younger boys who worked in the kitchen, and continuing until he’d met the whole group. Most people jumped at the chance to see the bell tower, it turned out, excited at the opportunity to look out over the city. Gradually he learned names and roles, conversed more and more over meals. This must be what it was like to be part of a community.

Now, almost a year later, he waved at a couple of them as he and Esmeralda approached the cathedral. He stopped to drop off the cakes, asking for them to be set aside for the younger boys, before he and Esmeralda headed up the stairs to his tower. They began to set up for that evening, pulling his table closer to the window and laying out the food they’d purchased.

When they’d finished, they still had another hour before Phoebus got off shift. The sky was beginning to darken, but the festival was still in full swing. When it was time to ring the evening bells, Esmeralda slipped downstairs for a moment – she still wasn’t used to the noise. Afterwards, they looked out over the city together, leaning over the railing. 

They watched the people celebrating, pointing out particularly funny costumes or drunken antics to each other. Esmeralda’s dancer friends came back out on stage after a while, their whirling skirts blending into a blur of color from above. Esmeralda draped an arm over his shoulders, and he leaned into the touch. They stood there above the city for some time, at peace in each other’s company.

There was a clatter behind them, and they turned to see Phoebus emerging from the stairs into the tower. “Finally!” he said. “Sorry I’m late. Everybody and their mother decided to get in a drunken brawl today.” He walked over to join them, clapping a hand onto Quasi’s shoulder and giving Esmeralda a peck on the cheek.

“That smells amazing,” he said. “How did you know exactly what I wanted to eat? Must be witchcraft after all.”

“You’re not that hard to figure out,” Esmeralda teased with a smile. “Now come eat. We’ve been sitting here staring at it while we waited for you.”

Phoebus collapsed into a chair. “Well I’ve been riding around drooling over all the food at the festival. Thank you both for picking it up. You come sit down too, let’s have our feast.” 

Quasi was really hungry, he realized, now that the rush of excitement from earlier was dying down. He and Esmeralda joined Phoebus at the table, and they began their meal. Phoebus told stories of what he’d seen on guard duty. People were getting pretty drunk by this point in the day, and he’d been breaking up fights for the last hour.

“We’re filling up the jail with drunks,” he said, “but we’ll let them out in the morning. No sense keeping them longer over a festival brawl.” He turned to Quasi. “How’d the crowning go? I was on the other side of the city, but I’m sorry I had to miss it.”

There were a lot of things Quasi could have said. It had been the capstone to the best year of his life, he’d felt dizzy with shock and elation when the crowd had cheered from him, he’d known Esmeralda and his other friends were watching and that had made something potentially traumatic feel safe… 

“It was nice,” was all he said. Phoebus and Esmeralda looked at him like they understood.

By the time they finished their meal, the sky was fully dark. There was one more thing Quasi had to do, something he’d been planning for months. He grabbed a sack of fireworks from a corner of the tower, where they were stored as far from the molten lead as possible. 

Clopin had suggested this, more or less. He’d been waxing poetic about ways to improve the festival, and Quasi had made the mistake of mentioning that the cathedral would be a great place to set them off. He’d mentioned it offhand to one of the cooks, recounting the story as a joke, and the idea had run away from him, somehow working its way up to the Archdeacon. Who, shockingly, had approved. Quasi wasn’t quite sure where the explosives had come from, but they’d made their way to him via Clopin along with a very basic list of safety rules. At least the cathedral roof was made of stone.

“Hold on, we’ll come up with you,” Phoebus said as he began to leave. “I’m not going to let you wander off with the explosives alone.” Quasi had expected him and Esmeralda to stay inside the tower, maybe have a nice romantic moment, but he wasn’t about to complain.

“Are you sure you can keep up with me?” Quasi teased, as he climbed out onto the roof. All the way up here, the night air was cool and the crowd below was only dots of torchlight and distant shouts. Phoebus and Esmeralda followed a moment later, joining him under the cloudless, starry sky. They set up the fireworks at the edge of the roof, then hauled up the buckets of water he’d prepared that morning.

There were long rope fuses on each of the fireworks. After lighting the end of the first one, they retreated as far back as they could. The firework shot into the sky with a boom, almost as loud as Big Marie. It was echoed by an appreciate roar from the crowd. Quasi felt a few sparks and bits of ash prick his skin, but overall it seemed like they were at a safe distance.

He crossed the roof again and set off the others, sending their blossoms of orange light off into the sky. After lighting the last few, he pulled back to rejoin his friends. The three of them sat on the far side of the tower, huddled together against the faint chill of the night air and swatting out the occasional spark. Esmeralda was warm against his side. Phoebus’s arm wrapped around her back, and his hand rested reassuringly on Quasi’s shoulder. The crowd below was filled with color and merriment and friendly faces, and for this one perfect night all was right with the world.


End file.
